OK, it doesn't really excersize your legs like a Stairmaster - but it does give you a workout nonetheless...
The Airmaster 77 is a multi-pump pneumatic in .177 caliber, and it is capable of shooting both BB's and pellets. BB's can be loaded into a reservoir which then feeds a spring-loaded 17 round magazine, while pellets have to be loaded singly into the breach well. The rifle is fairly light, weighing at a smidgen over 4.5lbs. Overall construction is reminiscent of a Crosman 1077, with a barrel tube nestled inside an outer shroud. The receiver housing is a metal casting, but the stock, cocking handle, and miscellaneous other parts are plastic.
This particular gun came into my possession a little over a year ago, when my daughter-in-law's boyfriend (lonnnnng story!) asked if he could keep it stored at my house. OK, I says - after all, there's plenty o' room in my closet.
Well, they've since broken up, he's not asked for it back, and I'm not quite sure what to do with it. But since it's here and it's a gun I'd never buy on my own - what the heck, I'll give it a bit of a workout. Probably doing the gun a favor, since it's generally not good for any mechanical contrivance to sit unused for long periods of time. So I pull it out of the closet, drip a few drops of oil onto it's felt pad, and start playing with it.
The Airmaster is a "bolt-action" rifle along the general lines of a bunch of other guns - the Crosman 760, the Daisy 856 and 880, and so on. It has a well into which pellets are dropped, and frequently land, nose first, tail first, or backwards. The deep, narrow well makes it difficult to get larger fingers in there it flip it around correctly, so a toothpick or something similar might be helpful to correct a pellet that "lands" wrong.
I'll be honest, I never really liked multi-pumps, and chrony testing this gun reminded me why. I didn't measure every single pump stroke, but by pump #5 the effort is up to about 30lbs. Full power (10 pumps) ends up requiring about 35 lbs of effort - so at LEAST strokes 5-10 end up taking about as much force as a single cock of a Gamo or Quest. And that's for one shot.
And what do you get with that one shot? Using Crosman Premiers, 10 shots across the chrony went from 719 to 735fps for an average of 728fps and about 9 ft-lbs of energy. 'At's a lot of work for so little return. Of course this is fairly typical of multi-pumps, and if you're willing to put up with a reduced velocity of about 600fps you can stop at 5 pumps. BB's, by the way, tend to go about 7-8% faster.
The trigger is so-so, with lots of creep and a moderate 5lb pull. Compared to the direct-sear Chinese and Norica rifles it isn't bad, but it shouldn't be difficult to make a lighter trigger on a pneumatic gun like this. The front sight is plastic with a fiber-optic insert. The rear looks to be the same simple blade sight as on the 1077 with no fiberoptics, and with a stepped ramp for elevation adjustment. WIndage is taken care of by a slotted hole in the rear sight and the holddown screws. It works, but it is difficult to adjust it in increments or to return to one setting after you've moved it. It's a cheap sight that belongs on a BB gun, not a rifle that tries to position itself in a higher niche.
After the chrony shots, I tried four different pellet at 10 yards indoors in an effort to evaluate accuracy. I used a Powerline 3-9x32 scope (not the cheapie 15mm that came with it). Granted - this gun is a few years old, and when the original owner shot it as a kid I imagine he used BB's a lot since they're cheap and easier to load. That could have taken a toll on the barrel. Premiers, RWS Geco's and Gamo Match all seemed to group on the order of .65" or so, which was a bit disappointing (Copperhead Wadcutters scattered something fierce). Granted, the trigger is heavier than I hoped for - but pneumatics are generally easy to shoot well and I was really expecting better than this. BB's, by the way, wandered around on the paper to the tune of about 3".
In general, this gun left me rather unimpressed. I wanted to like it - after all, the BB/pellet multi-pump is something of an American icon. Certainly the so-so accuracy is something to gripe about - and I don't care if it's caused by using steel BB's because the gun was made for them too. Maybe the real kicker is the price - over $70 for the "kit" which includes a $5 scope and so on. That's getting close to Crosman Quest territory, and the Quest is easier to shoot, faster to reload, more powerful and more accurate. It doesn't have the power "adjustability" inherent in a multi-pump, but I think that the only reason most people would shoot at a lower power is to avoid all that pumping!
Shooters who are used to the lower powered models 760, 856, and so on will probably find the added power of this gun to be an attractive bonus that might be worth the extra money. But, I think, only them. Frankly, I'm not sure that this gun would hold any real appeal for anyone else...